It was the loneliest I had felt in a long time. It reminded me of all those weekends I’d spent holed up inside my room back home, when I couldn’t tell Jackson about what Ben and Jake had threatened me with, when I couldn’t talk to my parents or Soraya.

Rome wasn’t supposed to feel like this.

• • •

I went to Tiberino, the restaurant on the island, to try and get some work done. I was supposed to be writing a Wikipedia page for another start-up the cryptocurrency guys had referred me to, some social networking start-up—because that was just what the world needed: another website for making friends. I couldn’t focus though. There were too many people around, too many tourists and happy families.

Plus, my table was wobbly. That was annoying as hell. I got a stack of napkins and crouched underneath the table to stuff them under one of the legs.

“What are you doing?”

I looked up and saw Laura’s ring-studded fingers.

“Dude, why don’t you just move to a different table?” she said.

“This whole outdoor area is on a slope,” I muttered, coming up. “You guys should fix that.”

“Never seemed to bother you before.”

We kissed one another on each cheek.

“It’s good to see you,” I said. “I’ve had a shitty couple of days.”

Laura looked at me funny. “Actually, I’ve been trying to find you,” she said, pulling up a chair. “I don’t know if this is going to help, but I wanted to tell you . . . your sister slid into my DMs.”

“How do you even know that expression—wait, what?”

“I did not respond,” Laura said quickly. She showed me the message on Instagram: hey, sorry if this is random, but I saw my brother Amir created your Wikipedia page and edited some other Italian pages. Do you know where he is? Is he in Italy?

“Oh, fuck,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “Shit. Shit, shit, shit. I really don’t need this right now.”

“Don’t need what?” Laura asked. There were other people around, so she leaned in and lowered her voice. “What’s going on?”

“I’d rather not talk about it,” I said.

“You’re going to have to,” Laura said firmly. “This is suspicious as hell. I thought maybe you had murdered someone or done something sketchy! I checked your Instagram, and I noticed you haven’t posted anything from Rome. I need you to explain what’s going on.”

Laura was waiting for me to say something. I sat there with my hands on the table, balled up in fists. I flattened them.

“Listen, Laura. I’m gay. And my family, they’re not particularly cool with that. So I’m sort of just . . . here, hiding out. That’s the truth.”

“Oh.” And then, after a pause: “Your sister is not cool with it?”

“No, she’s fine. But it’s my parents,” I said.

“Are they religious?” Laura asked. Jackson had asked the same question when we talked about coming out to our families.